China Mobile will release IoT chip similar to eSIM at the end of July, Xiao Qing, senior technical director of cooperation department of China Mobile Internet of Things Company, said at eSim Technology & Innovation Summit 2016.
China Mobile and industry-mainstream baseband chip makers have developed this technology jointly: the primitives of SIM, voice connection agent software and the operator's card are all built in the chip. This indicates that there's no need for subscribers to buy SIM card and put it in the slot.
Xiao Qing said, "This IoT chip can evade the safety problem and save the costs. With SIM card and slot cancelled, each card can save CNY 4 and the card printing process is also skipped."